Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what plans the Government has to increase access to financial education for people on low incomes.

Government policy on financial education and capability focuses on ensuring that people have the confidence and skills they need to successfully engage with their finances. To this end the Government established the Money Advice Service (MAS), which provides free-to-use financial guidance and coordinates the UK’s Financial Capability Strategy. This is a 10-year strategy which aims to gather evidence on the most effective interventions to improve people’s financial capability, and support and coordinate initiatives that are proven to work. As part of this strategy MAS will shortly publish plans to commission projects to help working age adults manage their money, which will include a focus on households on low incomes. The plans will also focus on the financial capability needs of children and young people at home, in school, and in community settings.

Moving forward, the Government is legislating to merge the functions of MAS with those of The Pensions Advisory Service (TPAS) and Pension Wise, to create a Single Financial Guidance Body to simplify the existing public financial guidance landscape. The government’s commitment to improving people’s financial capability is reflected in the new body’s strategic function to develop and coordinate a national strategy to improve the financial capability of members of the public, which will build on and further progress MAS’s work.

It is also particularly important that children and young adults receive financial education to help them shape their financial habits later in life. This is why financial literacy was made statutory within the national curriculum in England in 2014, as part of the curriculum for citizenship education for 11-16 year olds.